


A Palace for Our Bones

by Moorishflower



Series: The Lost Meteor [3]
Category: Homestuck, MS Paint Adventures
Genre: Childhood, Disturbing Themes, Gen, Horror, Horrorterrors - Freeform, Parenthood, Politics
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-05-17
Updated: 2013-05-17
Packaged: 2017-12-12 03:33:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 473
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/806700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moorishflower/pseuds/Moorishflower
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Sburb's meteors go astray, the Beta kids end up in the hands of the Ancestors, rather than the Guardians. It goes somewhat better than can be expected.</p><p>Or, adventures in the deep, with Rose and Her Imperious Condescension.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Palace for Our Bones

You are an unusually self-aware wiggler.

You know, for example, that your name is Rose, and you know this well before you have even learned to move your body in any meaningful way. You know that your lusus is not your lusus, per se, but that she is the Condesce, and that, for reasons unknown, she deigns to care for you. You know that you are not like the other trolls.

You know. You know. You know things that they don’t. You know things that the Condesce doesn’t know.

You are not even a half-sweep old when you hear the whispering, stretching out for you from fathomless depths. They resound through your bones, resonate, trigger something in your developing thinkpan that makes you _aware_. You are aware of the gentle night breeze on your bare skin. You are aware that you are naked, and chilly, and would prefer not to be. You are aware that your communicative abilities are still not developed enough to make this known to your guardian. This frustrates you. You begin to cry.

_Do not squall so, thornchild, daughter of our bones, dearest Rose, do not cry._

The Condesce has emerged from her office; she peers at you over the edge of your wiggler pen. Your crying stops. You reach for her, for her thick mane of hair, for the smooth-cool familiarity of her skin.

_You shall be Emissary of the day, dearest Rose, you shall hear the laments of your lessers and give them succour, you shall rule with an iron claw and a velvet kiss..._

You are cold. You are cold. You reach for the Condesce and she picks you up, sighing extravagantly. “The shit I do for you, li’l guppy,” she says.

_You shall tear down the hallowed temples of the old rule and you will be empress in their place, fierce as sunlight and beautiful as the stars._

She pats your head and offers you her finger to suckle; she tastes like sea-brine and blood in the water, salt and iron. She carries you in her huge enveloping arms to her office, where she holds you in her lap while she listens to her advisors, her consorts, the heads of their divisions, legislacerators and subjugglators and more, and more, always more. You see in your mind’s eye her finger in your mouth, your fangs sunk into her flesh, gnawed down to bloody tatters and the bright white of bone.

_Rose, oh Rose, how your petals hide your thorns, dearest Rose, beautiful and terrible as the light--_

You wind a lock of the Condesce’s hair around your fist, rubbing your cheek against it, soft as animal fur. Warmed, you close your eyes and listen to the singing from the deep, telling the story of you and your conquests, of the palace you make of their bones.


End file.
